Friday, February 23, 2018

Global Risk Maps

The global political landscape looks to be fairly turbulent in 2018. The UK's negotiations to leave the European Union, the USA's continuing threats of trade protectionism and North Korea's growing militarization all point towards increasing political instability around the world.

The Marsh Political Risk Map uses data from BMI Research to help visualize the issues that multinational organisations and investors need to consider in the year ahead. The interactive map rates countries around the world based on their political and economic stability. It gives each country a score out of 100 based on a number of factors, including social and political stability and external and internal threats.

If you want more concrete examples of the risks in countries around the world then you might also want to explore RiskMap. RiskMap is a free to use security and risk mapping portal which allows you to access news and real-time intelligence about the current risk situation in countries around the world.

The map displays hundreds of the latest events and incidents related to security events across the globe. Click on the colored
markers for these events and you can read a summary of the event (referenced to the original news source).

Behind the scenes the RiskMap algorithm looks at events and incidents of interest from over 1,000 different sources, This algorithm calculates
the risk represented by each incident and attempts to identify the type of risk posed and the facts of the incident such as the number of fatalities or casualties, A second algorithm then selects the most important information from the original source and creates a summarized copy of the event for the map.

If you are thinking about traveling abroad and want to know the associated risks then you might want to refer to the International SOS Travel Risk Map. International SOS provide a very basic interactive map of the travel risks in each country of the world. The Travel Risk Map provides an overview of the travel risks in each country for medical, security and road safety.

Countries are colored on the Travel Risk Map to show the International SOS assessment of the travel risks in these three categories. The map therefore provides a very basic guide as to where it is safe to travel in the world. Unfortunately it doesn't provide much information on the specific risks that you might encounter in each country.

Many governments provide useful advice for their citizens who are planning to travel abroad. For example the UK's Foreign and Commonwealth Office provides up-to-date Foreign Travel Advice. If you do use the Travel Risk Map then please also check your government's latest travel advice which will hopefully provide more detail on the specific risks associated with countries across the globe..